Member Notes:

Identified by the county ag. program. Beautiful black and red-orange bug--lays small black and white eggs in two rows a dozen or so at a time on the underside of cleome leaf--abslolutely devastates cleome!

I have several of these bugs (nymphs and adults) plus eggs all over my mustard and collard greens. I kill them by hand but it does not deter them. I have read about gardeners using pyrethrum plants as a companion plant to deter/repel these bugs but I have not tried this approach yet. I will try next spring and report back.

These are very destructive on Brassica's. They can shred the plants in no time. Damage is most apparent on broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and collards, but they can be quite damaging to the rest of the family as well.

This bug sucks! Literally. For three years, I've tried to grow kale, broccoli, and/or Brussel sprouts, and these little devils, while beautiful, have destroyed them. I've uploaded a picture with damage for your edification. Most organic controls they have laughed at (will try row covers this year) and even some 'inorganic' ones! Sevin claims to control, my bugs laughed at it. BTW, they are also stink bugs.

I've also heard that you can plant 'bait crops' to attract them, then cover with straw and burn early in the season to knock 'em down. Also, they do not hibernate, so cleaning the garden well between seasons and burning refuse will help...

This bug has given me a lot of grief in the vege patch, but this year I tried spraying them with a fairly strong solution of water and dishwashing liquid. It kills them in minutes but you have to go out and spray for a few days or even weeks to break the breeding cycle as they have four breeding cycles a year. first thing in the morning is the best time as they like to sunbake. Plus the solution will only kill what you hit with it, keeping the beneficial insect population intact and its harmless to your vegetables.

I have these bugs all over my alyssum's, they are sucking the life out of them. The guy at the nursery identified them for me and said to use Bayer Advanced Rose & Flower insect killer - hoping that works!!

I saw this bug for the first time yesterday. I had no idea what it was so I was researching and found a picture of it on this site. They had apparantly just hatched out. I'm assuming that it is new to this area since I had never seen it before. I showed them to some other people and none of them knew what it was either. Thanks to this website I now know what it is.

These bugs seem to attack my brassicas every other year in huge numbers. They only sure way I have found to defeat them is take away what they like to eat. In my USDA zone 7 am able to plant a winter garden with the help of Remay and TLC. They won't stick around for cold weather, but the brassicas love it.

I've only found these in one of my flower beds...the one that has Alyssum in it. Now that they have wiped that out they are working on the roses and coneflower. Cleaning up the beds in fall/winter doesn't help a bit!

Bonjour,
First, I just discover this insect (Harlequin Bug) with a strange three-line draft on the back, two weeks ago, in a field, near Rimouski (Québec, Canada). We found two different nests, very close to each other. Nobody around me had seen this kind of animal before!

When we saw it, we though it was a beetle nest (coccinelle). But it has no separation on the middle of the back. And they are no alike them. They live very close to each other, as you see on the picture.

Are they common far North? Where are they from? How do they come up here? Will they survive to winter? Are they dangerous for crops?

Just found this critter this morning. It has been eating holes in our broccoli plants and now we need to find out how to get rid of them and prevent them from coming back and getting to the cauliflower and other plants as well.